Disarmament: or 'The Tale of Ole Slashy'
by kanonkita
Summary: Starscream has the perfect doomsday device to destroy Megatron once and for all! Or, at least, he would if the idiotic warlord would stop distracting him...
1. Chapter 1

**Chapter One: Plotting**

There were three essential elements to a foolproof plot to overthrow Megatron: a brilliantly conceived and fabricated doomsday device, a good knowledge of the warlord's schedule, and something really pithy and poignant to shout at him before activating said doomsday device. At least, that was Starscream's current theory. As he had never actually concocted a foolproof plan for overthrowing Megatron, he couldn't be totally sure.

At the moment, he had one-and-a-half out of the three. Being Megatron's second-in-command, he always knew his schedule (he would have thought Megatron would stop including him on those memos, but it was almost as if the warlord _liked_ being ambushed in the hallways at random moments). He also had half of his latest doomsday device constructed, and this one was a real doozie. All he lacked was his witty one-liner of doom. He was thinking something like, "The chain of your fate is about to be severed!" on account of there being chainsaws involved, but he was open to feedback.

"This is a terrible idea," Thundercracker offered.

"I didn't ask _you_ ," his trineleader sneered back at him.

"Actually, you did," the other Seeker pointed out. "I came in here and said, 'What the frag is that?' and you were about to scream at me to get out, I think, but you changed your mind and said, 'What do you think? It's my latest plan for that old rust bucket,' instead, and then you talked at me for ten minutes about how it works."

Starscream frowned; that did sound familiar, but he still didn't appreciate the blunt manner of Thudercracker's feedback. His trinemate should know by now that he had a delicate sensibility and needed a gentle form of speech when receiving criticism, or else he was inclined to get pissy.

"What part of this plan is terrible?" he demanded. "It's an ununtrim-plated super droid with chainsaws for arms! What could possibly go wrong?"

Thundercracker sighed and rubbed a servo across his faceplates. "Starscream, you're not..." He trailed off with a noise like his words had run headlong into a steel wall, thought for a moment, and then continued in a rush: "You're not very patient, and you always leave holes in your coding, and I think that has the potential to create a horrific ending this time around."

"What!? I'm great at coding! I got top marks at the Academy!" Starscream protested.

"Mmmmno, I'm pretty sure that's the one you failed," Thundercracker contradicted, shaking his helm. "The comments on your final reports said that you couldn't focus long enough to finish programming a game of full stasis."

Starscream's frown deepened as the memory file in question came up, but then he waved it away.

"It'll be fine; I've been studying more," he assured the blue Seeker.

"That's not—"

"I don't understand why you're always so critical!"

"Starscream, your plans _always fail!_ "

"Maybe because I never get any support around here! You're my trine; you're supposed to stay behind me no matter what!"

"Actually, we're supposed to stay _beside_ you no matter what, but I'm sure Primus will forgive us if we reneg on that when there's a chainsaw-wielding super droid hurtling out of control toward you. Can't you go even a week without indulging your addiction for self-destruction?"

"I am not self-destructive! Like I said, I might actually get somewhere if you would be more supportive."

"Okay, well, I'm not supporting you this time; that's for sure," Thundercracker declared, turning to leave.

"Well, fine!" Starscream pouted, starting to turn back to his project when another thought popped into his processor. "Don't tell Megatron!" he called hastily.

Thundercracker raised a servo in acknowledgment just before the doors slid shut behind him. Starscream huffed and reached for his soddering iron.

"You're gonna do just fine, my little ununtrium-plated beauty," he purred, patting his doomsday device with all the fondness of a new creator.

* * *

There was really only one thing that was essential to making it through a meeting with Megatron, and that was a massive amount of patience. Unfortunately, Starscream had none.

" _Thrust!?_ " Starscream shrieked after looking over their latest mission plans. The conehead in question pulled his helm off the table with a snort and looked around to see who had been addressing him. "You're hinging this entire plan on _THRUST!?_ "

"And so what if I am?" Megatron challenged.

"He couldn't fly his way out of a wet paper bag!" his second howled. Thrust opened his mouth to defend himself, but stopped at a look from his Air Commander.

"His flight capabilities are perfectly adequate for the mission in question," Megatron growled. "I suggest you sit yourself down in that chair where you belong and let me finish this briefing, Commander Starscream."

The seeker's optics cycled open to their fullest extent, and then he hurled the datapads with their meeting plans down the length of the conference table with all the strength he could muster.

"I work too hard for this scrap!" Starscream screeched. "I'm not giving all the glory to _Thrust!_ "

"Wait, what am I doing again?" Thrust asked, blinking around stupidly.

"Leading an aerial assault on the Autobots' base," Skywarp yawned.

"Starscream, just _sit down!_ " Megatron barked. "We can talk about this later!"

"I am sick of you refusing to recognize my potential!" Starscream continued to rant as if he hadn't spoken. "And you wonder why none of your subordinates respect you! You have no idea how to show appreciation for anybody!"

"Respect for Megatron; infallible," Soundwave intoned.

"Oh, shut up, you!" the seeker spat at him. "It's alright for _you!_ You're the only one he ever actually _recognizes_! Why is that!? _Why_!? Plenty of us have worthwhile qualities of our own! I don't understand! Why do you never praise _me!?_ "

Megatron was staring at his Air Commander as if he had just turned into a massive organic bird.

"You know what?! I don't care! You can just go to the Pit!"

"Starscream—!"

The seeker didn't wait to hear the rest of it, turning on one thruster heel and marching out of the conference room without a backward glance.

* * *

There was nothing quite like throwing oneself into the construction of a doomsday device to work off frustrations. Starscream spent the next two days in his lab, ignoring all attempts from his trine or commander to gain his attention. He knew that if they were really concerned about him, Skywarp would just teleport in and get him. Until then, he needed total concentration on his Death Droid.

No focus, indeed... He would show them just what his "lack of focus" could achieve.

It was sometime on the morning of the third day when he found himself snorting out of a recharge session he hadn't realized he'd fallen into. Something slithered off his shoulder vents, and he turned around to see an insulation sheet pooled on the floor behind him. Before he had a chance to wonder much on its origin, a deep voice spoke up from the corner:

"If you insist on closing yourself off from the rest of the world for days on end, you might at least put an energon dispenser in here so that I know you are fueling yourself."

Starscream choked on his own glossa and whipped around to find Megatron perched on a stool behind him. He quickly turned back to his project, which was completely exposed, and jumped up from his own chair.

"THIS IS NOTHING!" he shrieked, scrambling to throw a tarp over the blank-faced droid. "I didn't make this! It's not what it looks like! _What are you doing in my lab!?_ "

Megatron just raised an optic ridge at him.

"Starscream, I don't much care what you get up to in here, I just prefer when I have some kind of reassurance that my second-in-command isn't starving himself to death," he sighed.

"As if!" the Seeker scoffed, resentment bubbling at the implication that he couldn't possibly get up to anything in his lab that Megatron might have to worry about. "I could never leave the Decepticons under _your_ command!"

"The Decepticons _are_ under my command," Megatron reminded him.

"Did you just come here to rub my nose in it?" Starscream snapped, optics narrowing.

Megatron sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose before continuing.

"The mission was a success," he said. "We got a massive haul of energon—enough to keep everyone in substantial rations for the next two months at least."

"Good for you. What's your point?" the Seeker griped, folding his arms across his chassis.

"The mission was a success for everyone except Thrust and his trine, who are all in the medbay with extensive damage," Megatron pressed on. "It'll be several weeks before they can go back on active duty."

"I told you they couldn't handle—"

"I _knew_ they couldn't handle it," the warlord cut across him. "That was the point of the plan."

Starscream reset his optics a couple of times.

"I'm sorry... What?"

Megatron shifted awkwardly on his stool. "We needed a group of fliers to create a distraction, but I knew it was too dangerous for someone like Thrust to ever volunteer his trine."

"I could've handled it!" Starscream protested. "My trine is more than up to the task of taking on any Autobots!"

"I wasn't willing to risk that."

The words hung in the air between the two of them for one seemingly endless moment, and then Megatron got back to his pedes, clearing his vocalizer with a burst of static.

"Stop hiding in here and come out already," he grumbled, heading for the door. "Your presence is missed."

* * *

If there was one thing Starscream was sure of, it was that exactly no one on the entire _Nemesis_ ever missed his presence except maybe Skywarp on very special occasions. This was only one of many things that the Seeker found suspicious about his commander's visit to his lab, and which eventually prompted him to venture forth into the outside world in search of answers.

"Well, would you look who it is!" Thundercracker called over the hubbub of the mess hall when Starscream wandered in looking for some fuel.

The noise died down for a moment as helms turned his way, but quickly rose up again when everyone realized it was just their Air Commander back from wherever he'd skulked off to this time. Starscream glared down his nose at the lot of them.

A pop and flash of purple announced Skywarp's arrival at his side, and Starscream only just managed to dodge the incoming helmlock.

"So, what'd Megatron threaten you with that got you out so fast?" his trinemate wanted to know.

"Why would he have _threatened_ me with anything?" Starscream demanded.

"Well, he was asking where you were earlier, and then when we told him, he got real mad and stormed off," Skywarp explained. "Me and T.C. were kinda half-expecting to see you in the medbay next."

Starscream snorted in derision. "Megatron hasn't had the guts to try and slag me in months."

And then he paused as he realized that was oddly true. Was his leader finally starting to get tired of him? Was he not even worth punishing anymore? But no; you didn't put insulation covers over someone you were sick of or avoid sending them on potentially risky missions. So, what did it all _mean?_

"Ah, well..." Skywarp shrugged, clearly not half so interested in their leader's motivations as Starscream was. "Come have a cube with us. You look like slag, Megatron or no."

Starscream grumbled, but allowed Skywarp to lead him cube in hand back to the table where their third trine mate was already sitting.

"So," the blue seeker said when his trine leader had settled, "how's your project coming along?"

"Perfectly on schedule, thank you very much," Starscream sniffed, raising his cube to take a sip.

"What project?" Skywarp wanted to know, sliding in beside Starscream and tugging the smaller seeker close against his side.

"None of your business," Starscream assured him, shrugging the purple seeker off himself.

"He's making a death droid to pit against Megatron," Thundercracker told him.

"What!?" Skywarp threw his helm back and laughed. "That is the stupidest thing you've ever tried!"

"You sure that wouldn't have been the time he tried filling Megatron's quarters with squids while he was recharging?" Thundercracker chuckled.

"Oh, ha ha," Starscream said sarcastically. "Let's all laugh at the genius for having ambitions."

"Oh, Star. We've never doubted you're a genius," Skywarp assured him. "You just..."

"Struggle to effectively utilize your talents?" Thundercracker suggested.

"I was gonna say he gets really stupid whenever Megatron's involved, but yeah. That too," Skywarp nodded.

Starscream felt his face plates heat and buried himself in his fuel to hide it. He was pretty sure Skywarp didn't know— _couldn't_ know—how close he was to a rather embarrassing truth there.

"So, when will it be ready?" Thundercracker wanted to know. "Just so I know when to not be on base."

"I... have a few more kinks to iron out before it'll be ready," Starscream muttered.

"I'll have to stop by and see it sometime before Megatron pulls it apart," Skywarp mused.

"That's not gonna happen this time," Starscream assured them, knocking back the rest of his fuel.

* * *

Starscream reported to the command room for duty later that afternoon after a trip to the wash racks, freshly scrubbed wings held high and helm thrown back. He had some serious detective work to be doing, and he could be nothing but resplendent for it.

Megatron and Soundwave were poring over a bunch of schematics for something that could only have been designed by a human when Starscream sauntered in. Soundwave threw him what was probably supposed to be a judging look (there was a judgmental tilt to his helm at any rate) as soon as he had stepped through the doors, but it took Megatron a bit longer to acknowledge his presence.

"Glad to see you've decided to stop shirking your duties in favor of your personal projects, Starscream," he said finally, glancing at Starscream over the top of those little rectangular spectacles he sometimes wore when reading.

"My personal projects always have the well-being of the Decepticon cause at the core of their motivation, and isn't furthering our cause my main duty as your second-in-command?" the seeker asked, peering down his nose at the warlord.

Megatron raised an eyebrow at him.

"Your _main_ duty as my second-in-command is to be by my side and advise me," he reminded the seeker.

"Well, as you seem to have that covered, I fail to see how my _presence_ could have been _missed_ ," Starscream said, his voice sickly sweet as he threw a pointed glance at Soundwave.

The look on Megatron's face was priceless—like Starscream had just walloped him over the helm with a sledgehammer.

"So, what are we looking at?" the seeker moved on, sweeping over to take a look at the schematics before his commander could collect himself enough to comment. "Are we stealing another super computer? You do remember how that ended the last time, right?"

"We _hijacked_ the computer last time," Megatron reminded him. "Stealing one entirely is a different matter."

"Oh, sure. Now you can crush the whole computer with your fat aft instead of just the remote control."

"Maybe if you had provided more adequate air support..." the warlord grumbled.

"Sorry, I didn't want to _risk_ it," Starscream said, twisting seductively as he leaned across the table toward him.

Megatron straightened up.

"Why do you do this, Starscream?" he demanded.

"What?" the seeker asked, blinking innocently up at him.

"You know perfectly well what," the older mech growled.

And now it was Starscream's turn to get frustrated because...

"No, I _don't_!" he snapped, also straightening up as much as possible while still leaning across the table. "You never make a lick of sense, you over-inflated zeppelin!"

"That's rich coming from you!"

"Don't get smart with me now!"

"Well, one of us has to be the brains in this operation!"

"This," Starscream snarled, jabbing a clawed digit into the schematics on the table, "is the stupidest idea I have ever seen! What are you even going to do with a computer the size of this room that takes a full hour to search through a terabyte of information?!"

"It is connected to the humans' network of nuclear warheads. We can use it to hold their whole planet hostage," Megatron informed him smugly.

"Connected by ethernet and _landlines_!" his second shrieked. "The humans barely have wireless networks yet, and they don't use them for anything that important! The whole thing would be useless the second you got it out of their base."

Megatron blinked and then turned to Soundwave, who had been standing off to the side, messing with a label peeling up from one of the command consoles while the other two argued.

"He knows I'm right," Starscream huffed, cocking one hip and planting a servo on it. "He's just too much of a wimp to tell you."

"Information regarding human wireless networks; insufficient to confirm or deny," Soundwave announced.

"Even if they did have one, we wouldn't be able to access it from the bottom of the sea," Starscream pointed out.

"We could bring it to another location," Megatron tried

"And the Autobots would find us and steal it back, or at least interrupt our work before we could finish it somehow," his second countered. "If you want to hold the whole world hostage with their own weapons, then steal the weapons themselves."

"Transporting nuclear warheads; inadvisable," Soundwave cut in.

"Spoilsport," the seeker huffed.

"All the same, Starscream raises some valid points," Megatron sighed.

Starscream reset his audials, not sure he'd heard that correctly.

"I do?"

"We ought to gather more information on the specifications of this computer before making any further plans," his commander said, starting to roll up the schematics.

"Wait, seriously?"

"You have advised me, Starscream, and I have taken your advice," the warlord said. "Isn't that what you wanted?"

"Well... in a way, yes, but..."

"Really, Starscream," Megatron interrupted him, a smile pulling at his mouth. "Only you could find something to argue about when I'm agreeing with you."

The seeker scowled, wishing he could find more to argue about because this was getting uncanny.

"Your glasses look stupid," he groused, just for appearance's sake, before sweeping back out of the room.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two: Prodding**

Starscream heaved yet another sigh as he flicked through the lines of his death droid's coding. He was supposed to be looking for grammatical errors in the parts that he'd written while half-awake last night, but all he could think about was Megatron and his bizarre behavior of late.

What was the warlord up to? There had to be some ulterior motive behind his sudden niceties. Perhaps it was like the traps of sugary substances they used to catch the various insects that entered the base via the many careless and unhygienic members of their crew. Megatron was trying to draw him in with sweetness and... what? What could he possibly gain from making Starscream _like_ him?

The seeker groaned and shoved his datapad away from himself. He couldn't concentrate on this slag right now.

"You'd cut the truth out of him if I let you loose, wouldn't you?" he asked the not-yet-activated droid. It just stood there on its one spherical wheel, chainsaws dangling wickedly at its sides. Starscream tried to imagine Megatron's face when the thing lopped that bucket of a helm from his shoulders, but it didn't bring anything like the satisfaction that it had the first couple hundred times he'd pictured it.

With a huff of frustration, he got to his pedes and made for the lab door. A turn around the base might serve to clear his processor a bit, and then he could get back to work.

There was no one else in the halls as Starscream made his way around, which was surprising until he checked his chronometer and realized that it was already the middle of the recharge cycle. Well, that was just perfect. It gave him plenty of space to think.

He needed to peel back the layers of this Megatron situation and get to the core of it. Otherwise, he could be going into his latest assassination plot with insufficient information, which could in turn prove fatal.

Well, not really fatal because Megatron never did kill him no matter what he did, and what was with that, anyway? He'd always assumed that it was some small concession on Megatron's part that he was too valuable despite all of his treacheries, but what if it was something more? What if...

 _What if_ , though?

In the last few months, Megatron had stopped punishing him altogether, had started listening to him, had told him that he was _missed!_ What if Megatron specifically was the one who had been missing him?

Starscream stopped short in his meanderings as his processor suddenly started to spin with the possibilities. Megatron... had a crush on him? It wasn't too terribly out of left field, he supposed. He was, objectively speaking, an incredibly attractive mech, after all. Not to mention brilliantly cunning and skilled in just about every area a Decepticon warrior should be. He would have a crush on himself too if it wouldn't have been a pathetically lonely thing to do.

Oh, but if this was true, then there was so much potential! He just needed some way to confirm it once and for all.

Gleeful curiosity pushed all other thoughts from Starscream's processor, like the reminder that confronting Megatron directly never ended well for him, and he found himself making his way straight for his leader's quarters, cackling under his breath all the way as an idea formed. He couldn't wait to see the look on Megatron's face when the old mech realized that he'd been found out. Pervert. Starscream was barely half his age.

Starscream had to hold down the buzzer on Megatron's door comm for a good five minutes before the warlord appeared bleary-optic'ed and hazy-looking in the doorway.

"What is it now, Starscream?" his leader yawned.

"I have a matter of some deep importance that I would like to speak with you about, my lord," Starscream replied in his most sycophantic tone.

"And it couldn't have waited four more hours?" Megatron grumbled.

"Would I be here if it could?" the seeker pointed out.

"Fine. What is it?"

Starscream huffed in annoyed impatience. "We cannot be discussing such things out in the corridors where anyone could overhear it! Invite me in already!"

Megatron's face darkened in response. "Starscream, if you are here to plant incendiaries or sea creatures in my quarters again..."

"I am _not!_ " his second shrieked, and some genuine hurt must have crept into his expression because Megatron blinked in surprise and stepped aside without further argument. The seeker sniffed and made sure to clip him under the nose with the tip of one wing as he swept past into the quarters beyond.

He hadn't been in here since the squid fiasco (which, despite Thundercracker's disbelief, _had_ had a very logical and well-thought-out point behind it), and things looked different in general when he was looking at them as more than potential obstacles to his attempts to sneak about his leader's personal space. For instance, he'd never fully noticed the writing desk in the corner, covered in half-empty data pads and scraps of holopaper that looked like they'd spent a lot of time in someone's subspace.

Starscream moved over to glance at one of them and caught the words, _'I love you as certain dark things are to be loved, in secret, between the shadow and the soul.'_

"Still composing ballads in your spare time, I see," he sneered, reaching for the paper to read the rest of it. Megatron snatched it up off the desk before he could.

"That's, uh... No, that's one that I was... studying," the warlord stammered. "It's not... Don't read it."

A smile crept across Starscream's face. He did love it when he managed to catch his leader off guard. There was nothing quite so satisfying as the sight of a faint blush coloring the cheeks of a mech with Megatron's age and experience.

"So? What did you want to discuss?" Megatron asked gruffly to hide his embarrassment.

Well, Starscream supposed, here went nothing. He stepped forward enough that he had to look up past the rim of his helm to see his leader's face.

"Actually," he said in his sultriest voice. "I wanted to discuss _us_."

Megatron froze, and Starscream could practically hear the gears in the old fool's processor grinding to a halt. Give it a minute though, and he was sure they would come back on in full force, along with his cooling fans and whatever passed for an interface array on a mech his age. Or at least, they'd better. Starscream was going to rip his interface array clean off if they didn't.

"I know that we've had our... _differences_ in the past, Megatron," the seeker continued, inching a bit closer. "But I can't help feeling that something's changed about you lately, and... Well, do you not find me attractive?"

The warlord managed to unstick his jaw at last.

"Starscream, I have had enough of your trickery and games for one evening," he growled, taking the seeker roughly by the shoulder vent and starting to drag him back toward the door.

"Ow! _It's not a trick!_ " Starscream squealed, and then stopped short as he realized with a sense of overwhelming dread that that was far more true than he wanted it to be. This wasn't a trick. He wanted this. He needed to know this once and for all.

Megatron had stopped too and was looking at him curiously, searchingly. Starscream turned away, hiding a blush of his own now. He couldn't believe this was happening—that he had managed to walk right into this. Skywarp was right: he did turn into an idiot when Megatron was involved.

"Actually," he mumbled, "never mind. I was just playing around. I'll... I'll leave now."

The large, black servo still resting on his shoulder stopped him.

"Starscream?"

He didn't want to look, but Megatron's servo turned his face up so that their optics met.

"You are a frighteningly intelligent mech," the warlord said, his voice low but clear. "I think you would know well what I think of you if you were able to cast aside your own pride for more than two seconds."

Starscream swallowed and felt his spark starting to speed up.

"Assume I don't," he whispered. "I refuse to believe anything until I hear it from your own mouth."

"While I have a hard time believing anything that _does_ come out of your mouth," Megatron challenged.

"I hate you," Starscream hissed, more to test out the feel of the words right now than for anything.

"See what I mean?" the other mech snorted. He pulled his hand away from Starscream's face, withdrawing to sit on the couch. "I have been aware of your feelings for me and the true motivations behind most of your failed coup attempts for some time now."

"I haven't the slightest idea what you're talking about," the seeker assured him, panic starting to rise. He'd known? But how could he know? Not even Starscream's trine knew! He had to be bluffing.

"I can't say that I didn't find them frustrating and inconvenient for a good long time," Megatron continued as if his second hadn't spoken at all. "But I find my perspective shifted of late."

"I... what?"

Megatron leaned back on the couch, smirking at his second's growing bewilderment.

"You're right, Starscream," he said. "I cannot deny that I find you highly attractive, and not just your physicality." His optics trailed up and down the seeker's form, lingering on his narrow waist and the expanse of his wings.

"Primus!" Starscream breathed, resisting the urge to shield his more intimate areas from view. "You really were trying to catch me!"

"Guilty as charged," Megatron confessed, starting to get up. "But let us continue this conversation in the morning. I believe it would be wise for the both of us to get some rest for tonight."

But Starscream had waited 4 million years for this moment, and he wasn't about to give it up just for Megatron's aging gyros and their need for recharge. The warlord should have thought of that before making him wait this long in the first place. He crossed the room in two easy strides and planted his servos firmly on Megatron's broad shoulders, shoving him back into the couch.

"Starscream—" Megatron began.

"Shut up!" the seeker snarled, leaning down to clamp his lips over his leader's. Megatron stiffened for a moment, and then kissed back, humming in delight as his servos came up to grip Starscream's hips and pull him into his lap.

"I shouldn't..." Megatron murmured as he broke away from their kiss, but he was already sliding his servos up to sweep over the backs of Starscream's wings. "This is another one of your plots, isn't it?"

"If it is, then you're just going to have to make sure that I can't focus on anything but you," Starscream hummed in his audial, and as Megatron gave a low rumble of amusement at the challenge, he knew that neither of them was going to be getting much recharge that evening.

* * *

Starscream woke with his helm pillowed on his arms, his frame warm and comfortable despite an unfamiliar ache in his hip joints. There was a weight across his lower back, which didn't move when he shifted. His processor buzzed, trying to catch up with the rest of what was going on, and he opened his optics.

The seeker jolted violently as he found himself almost nose to nose with an unconscious Megatron. And then the memories started returning. He settled back into the berth, now recognizing the weight on his back as his commander's arm, and watched the warlord's face twitching slightly as he continued to recharge.

Starscream was still trying to make sense of what exactly had happened last night. He and Megatron had... And it was _good_ , but... _Why?_

He reached out a tentative servo and brushed a digit down the length of the older mech's nose. He'd always liked Megatron's nose—the way it looked like he could practically use it as a battle axe. He liked those stupid glasses of his, too, for whatever reason. He had been giving himself servo cramps for years making his handwriting so tiny that Megatron would have no choice but to break out those glasses to read his reports. He had been nose to nose with Megatron so many times in the past while the warlord screamed at him for some offense or other, and he had always wondered how it would be to find himself in this position instead.

Megatron shifted in his recharge, the arm around Starscream's back tightening to pull the seeker a little bit closer. Starscream allowed it, burrowing into the warmth of his leader's broad chassis.

He stayed that way a few more minutes, listening to the beat of Megatron's spark beneath his thick armor, before deciding that he had things he needed to do before Megatron woke up. Ever so carefully, he started wriggling his way out of the warlord's clutches, doing his best not to disturb him in the process. He was halfway out when his bedmate shifted again and his optics cracked open. The seeker froze.

"Starscream?" Megatron mumbled, still half in recharge.

"Is there anyone else you'd expect to be waking up next to?" the seeker asked, sickly sweet and dangerous.

His commander chuckled—a deep, sleepy noise that shook the berth beneath them, and started pulling his second closer once more.

"Thought maybe it was a dream," he said, nuzzling into the top of the seeker's helm. "I've had this dream so many times before..."

Something hot squeezed at Starscream's spark, and it took him a moment to get the next words out.

"Then why did you always hurt me?" he wanted to know.

"You kept trying to kill me," Megatron reminded him. "And I did stop."

Fair enough, but still... Starscream pushed his helm up under his commander's chin, burying his face in the other mech's neck cables.

"You smell nice," Megatron told him.

"You smell like a retirement home," Starscream returned.

"Nice try, but it'll be a while before you get me into one of those," his commander assured him, pinching the seeker's aft.

Starscream yelped and slapped at him. Megatron just started finding more places in which to pinch him.

"Stop! That!" the seeker squealed, slapping and struggling his way out of the warlord's grasp. "I have things I need to attend to," he announced when he'd gotten himself back to his pedes beside the berth, his wrist still captive in Megatron's servo.

"Stay a little longer?" his leader offered, optics smoldering hopefully.

"I've got things to do, you insatiable bolthead!" Starscream snapped, wrenching himself free.

"Another time, then," Megatron said, his gaze fixed on the seeker's retreating aft.

"Maybe," Starscream sniffed, knowing full well that 'maybe' was definitely 'definitely.'

* * *

Starscream stared up at his death droid and sighed. What was he going to do with it? Megatron already knew that it existed—he'd seen it clear as day when he was in here yesterday morning. Perhaps Starscream could reprogram it and present it to his new fling as a gift? He could just play the whole thing off.

One thing that was for sure was that he had suddenly lost all desire to watch it tear his commander apart. A 'facing partner as good as Megatron wasn't something to be taken lightly, after all.

And that's all they were going to be—colleagues with benefits, so to speak. There would be no... _deeper meaning_ to their times together; he wouldn't let it be like that. No matter what his stupid post-coital programming was begging him for.

"Of course, I could keep you around in case things ever go south," he mused, running a digit along the edge of one of his droid's chainsaws. "He might be surprisingly useful in the intimate arena, but he's still a pin-headed moron."

The robot made no reply, as usual, and Starscream just sighed again. He just couldn't be _bothered_ with anything today. His whole processor was full of an insipid golden cloud with the word "Megatron" lurking at its center.

A pop and momentary flash of purple alerted him to his trinemates' arrival, just before Skywarp's voice rang out with, "Wow, that thing's intense, Starscream!" from behind him.

"Don't compliment it, Warp. You'll only encourage him," came Thundercracker's disapproving tones a moment after.

"What are you two after?" their trine leader griped turning to scowl at them.

"Just you," Skywarp assured him, moving forward to drape an arm over his shoulders. "We wanted to take a flight with you."

"I'm busy," Starscream told them, though he was in a good enough mood at the moment that he didn't shrug Skywarp off of himself.

"You're always busy," Thundercracker pointed out. "Why not take an hour or two off from being busy for once and do something more constructive with your time?"

"I _am_ being constructive," Starscream sniffed, certain that Thundercracker was implying that his projects were doomed to failure and therefore not worth spending time on.

"Well, you certainly are constructing something for once," Skywarp agreed, leaving his trine leader to inspect the droid more closely. "What do you call it?"

"It's just 'Unit One.' It doesn't need a name," Starscream replied. "Don't touch it. You always manage to break something."

"He didn't name it because then he'll be too attached to it when Megatron has Hook break it down for parts," Thundercracker snorted.

Starscream just glared at him. The other seeker smirked unrepentantly back.

"I'd call it 'Ole Slashy,'" Skywarp announced. "You know, because of—"

"The chainsaws, yes. Your innovation and creativity will change the world someday, Warp," Starscream interrupted him.

"No, I think it's pretty apt," Thundercracker put in. "It can slash, can't it? Or will it just flail pointlessly and explode?"

Starscream had had just about enough of Thundercracker's attitude.

"It works," he growled, stepping over and hitting the power button on the side of the robot, "just _fine!_ "

There was a whirring, whining noise, and Ole Slashy straightened from the slump it had been standing in for the last few months, its optics spluttering and coming online.

"Woah!" Skywarp exclaimed, jumping back. "That's _cool_ , Star! How's it work?"

"Voice commands," Starscream explained, his annoyance growing at the continued look of concerned disbelief on Thundercracker's face. "Watch this: Unit One, physical functionality. Provide proof."

"UNIT ONE FUNCTIONAL," the droid announced in a monotone even more grating than Soundwave's. Starscream winced. He was going to have to fix that.

"Provide proof," he reminded it.

The droid then went through a full range of its motor functions: bending over in every direction, straightening, wheeling around in a couple of circles, spinning about at the waist, and a full flex of its chainsaw arms.

"PHYSICAL FUNCTIONALITY EXCELLENT," it reported when finished.

"You see?" Starscream said, gesturing to it proudly. "It works just fine."

"Yeah, but can it kill Megatron?" Thundercracker wanted to know.

Starscream was just opening his mouth to answer that when his pet project did it for him: "COMMAND: KILL MEGATRON, RECEIVED."

"NOO!" Starscream shrieked. "Abort command!"

But his robot was already rolling toward the door.

"Abort command! Abort command!"

"Aw, just let it go try," Thundercracker laughed as his trine leader flung himself forward to grab the robot around its waist.

"I am your creator!" Starscream screeched at it. "You will obey me!"

"OBSTACLE TO PRIME OBJECTIVE DETECTED," the droid replied, and then it swung a chainsaw back at its cling-on, catching the end of one of Starscream's wings and slicing a good foot of the tip off.

All three seekers instantly fell silent, right up until the moment that Starscream's pain sensors caught up to what had just happened.

"YOU SPIKE-SUCKING PIECE OF SCRAP!" the seeker howled, staggering back from his invention and flicking energon around the lab from his injured wing. "I'M GONNA BLOW YOU INTO SUCH TINY PIECES THE _PLANKTON_ WILL BE CHOKING ON YOU FOR THE NEXT _HUNDRED_ _YEARS!"_

"Starscream, don't—" Thundercracker tried, reaching out to stop his trine leader just before the enraged Air Commander let loose a volley of nullray blasts on the droid.

Every single one of the blasts ricocheted off the ununtrium plating. The seekers dove for cover behind various shelving units and lab tables, Thundercracker and Skywarp on one side of the room and Starscream on the other. As the shooting subsided, the droid spoke up once more.

"THREAT TO FUNCTIONALITY LOCATED. PRIME DIRECTIVE DIVERTED."

" _What!?_ " Starscream shrieked, ducking his head out from behind his table in fury. "When did I program you to do that!?"

"Starscream, stay down!" he heard Thundercracker shout somewhere through the dust.

"Don't let it get him, T.C.!" Skywarp's frightened cry cut in.

Starscream rolled his eyes at his trinemate's concern. He had programmed and built the droid himself; it would be no problem to dodge its maneuvers and reach the fail safe power down switch on its back.

The fail safe power switch that he had been too distracted to install last night.

"FRAG!" he declared, ducking back around the lab table.

"TARGET LOST," Ole Slashy announced, and Starscream realized that he also had not yet gotten around to installing a heat-sensing routine. The thing was relying on light alone.

"Ha! Loser!" he cackled.

"NEW TARGETS ACQUIRED," Ole Slashy intoned, and the seeker poked his head back up curiously, just in time to see it hurtling toward his trine mates on the other side of the room.

Starscream shrieked, and looked around for anything he could weaponize. There was a bottle of hydrofluoric acid on the shelf next to him. He chucked it as hard as he could at the drone's back.

There was some part of him that was proud of his own ingenuity when the caustic acid had no effect on his invention whatsoever, but it was eclipsed by the utter horror that flooded him as one of the robot's chainsaws nearly decapitated Thundercracker. It would have succeeded, had Skywarp not grabbed hold of his trinemate and warped them both to stand beside their leader.

"What in the Pit, Star!?" Thundercracker roared when they had popped back into existence at his wingtip.

"It's not supposed to do that!" Starscream wailed in explanation.

"Oh, well, that's great!" the blue seeker snarled. "I feel real assured now!"

Skywarp just made a whimpering noise and shrank behind his trinemates as the robot started to spin in place, searching for its lost quarries. Its arms swung out wildly on either side of it, slicing through shelving units and walls.

"SEEKING TARGETS. SEEKING TARGETS..." it droned, and it began to roll about the lab. It hit a bulkhead and kept going, hacking and slashing at the metal like so much tissue paper until it had given itself a sufficient hole to slip through.

"Oh, scrap!" Starscream breathed as his experiment disappeared out into the hallways of the Nemesis.

"What do we do?" Skywarp whined. "Whaddowedowhaddowedo _whaddowedo?_ "

"We need to sound the alarm," Thundercracker concluded, reaching a digit up to his comm link.

Starscream grabbed his wrist and tugged it back down with a panicked squeal.

"Megatron will be furious at me if he finds out!" he shrieked.

Thundercracker just gave him a look that said, "And that's my problem _how?_ " in no uncertain terms and wrenched his servo free.

"Thundercracker to Soundwave, we have an emergency," he said, turning away from his trinemates. "Yeah. Yeah, a Starscream-level emergency."

Starscream hissed his annoyance, but was cut off by the sound of a long, drawn-out scream and rending metal from out in the hall.

Ole Slashy had found his first victim.

"We're all gonna die, aren't we?" Skywarp concluded.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three: Panicking**

Dragstrip was the first one down. They found him lying in two pieces a little ways up the corridor from Starscream's lab.

"Warp, bring Hook here!" Thundercracker ordered, dropping down beside the frightened youngling. Skywarp nodded and popped out of sight.

"What's the point?" Starscream sniffed. "He's done for anyway."

"Don't listen to him; he's an idiot," Thundercracker assured the Stunticon before turning back to his trineleader. "Isn't there any other way to turn that thing off? Or destroy it?"

"I mean, eventually it'll run out of power," Starscream shrugged. "I suggest we just keep everyone out of its way until then."

"How long will it take?" the blue seeker wanted to know.

"Four months? Maybe five?"

Thundercracker's optics widened in outrage, and he was just opening his mouth—probably to scream at his trine leader—when Skywarp reappeared with Hook and Scrapper.

"I thought maybe Scrapper would have ideas," the purple seeker explained as Hook hurried over to his patient. "He's an ideas kind of guy."

"Ununtrium-plated, eh?" Scrapper asked, looking thoughtful. "Where'd you get the stuff?"

"That's none of your business," Starscream snapped, folding his arms across his chassis.

"Raided Shockwave's store, did you? He's gonna be pissed when he finds out."

"Can we remember that our comrades' _lives_ are at stake here!?" Thundercracker cut in. "And our best plan of action so far is to abandon the base for five months!?"

"Or four..." Starscream muttered.

"Right, well. If we get close enough to it, I bet we could figure something out," Scrapper sighed. "Which way did it go?"

"There," Starscream told him, gesturing to the chainsaw marks leading away down the hall. "You guys track it down. I'm going back to my lab to—"

Thundercracker reached out and grabbed the back of his shoulder vent as he started walking away.

"Oh, no you don't, Star," he growled. "You made this mess and you're getting in the slag with the rest of us."

"I was just gonna get my other nullrays!" the smaller seeker protested, flapping both his arms and wings in a fruitless attempt to loosen his trinemate's hold on him, indignant that his tirnemate thought so little of him. He would never walk away from a mess he'd made when it endangered something else that he wanted!

* * *

They passed four more fallen comrades along the way: Bitstorm, Dirge, Long Haul, and Astrotrain. Injuries ranged everywhere from the deep but non-threatening gash in Long Haul's leg plating to Bitstorm, whose left side had mostly been sheered off. Hook fixed up Long Haul, and the two of them took care of the wounded while the others moved on.

Five wasn't such a terrible casualty count in the grand scheme of things, but considering there were less than 40 Decepticons in the entire base... Well, it would be best if they could keep it at five.

Soundwave managed to get the emergency alert system going around the time they found Astrotrain, and sirens blared along the halls as they followed the trail of destruction onward.

"I didn't know that still worked!" Skywarp shouted over the noise.

Neither had Starscream, and he sincerely wished it didn't. If the alarm was going, then Megatron knew what was happening. The warlord would come out to face Ole Slashy without fail, never once doubting that he could best an ununtrium-plated super droid in servo-to-servo combat, and Ole Slashy would rip through his thick miner's plating like so much tin foil because that was what the thing was designed to do. It wouldn't stop like it had with the others, either—not until it registered that Megatron's life functions had ceased. Because that was also what Starscream had designed it to do.

Starscream had to find a way to stop it before that happened, but hopefully without losing his own spark in the process.

He hailed Skywarp over the comms as they got close enough that they could hear what seemed to be the commotion of combat.

 _::I don't wanna talk to you. You did this.::_ his trinemate replied.

 _::Oh, just shut up and listen,::_ Starscream snapped back at him. _::If that thing gets anywhere near Megatron, I want you to warp him out of there. I don't care if it looks like he can take it or he thinks he can take it, you get. Him. Out of there!::_

Skywarp threw a quizzical look in his direction.

 _::I thought the whole point was to kill Megatron.::_

 _::Yes, well... I just don't want him dead right now!::_

 _::Whatever you say,::_ Skywarp finally conceded, and the line closed.

Thundercracker looked over at them suspiciously. He would be aware that something had just happened without him, of course, but didn't seem especially concerned with figuring out what it was.

They rounded another corner and came into the corridor that led to the main control room. Thundercracker pulled up sharply as he almost ran straight into Soundwave, who was stood in the middle of the hall with Rumble and Frenzy peeking out around his legs.

"What's going on?" Starscream demanded, stepping over to them. "Soundwave, report!"

The intelligence officer just pointed ahead to the control room with a spurt of static.

"SEEKING TARGET. SEEKING TARGET." A toneless voice droned over the crashing of glass and rending of metal.

"It's hacking into the main frame," Rumble explained when it became apparent that his creator wasn't going to.

"What!? I never gave it hacking capabilities!" the seeker protested.

"No, you don't get it. It's _hacking_ into it," Frenzy corrected him, slashing his arms through the air in demonstration.

"Oh."

Well, that explained Soundwave's horror, at least.

"You made that thing, Screamer?" Frenzy wanted to know. "So, how we gonna stop it?"

"I'm still thinking!" Starscream snapped at him.

"Well, don't think too long. It's gonna run out of computers to hack up pretty soon and start looking for more bots," Thundercracker told him.

Almost on cue, the crashing sounds from within the control room came to a stop. Skywarp made a squeaking noise and shrank behind his trinemates as the proceeding silence stretched.

"Did it... run out of fuel early?" Scrapper whispered.

"Impossible," Starscream hissed back at him. "It's just... recomputing?"

"Starscream; does not know about his own creation?" Soundwave asked, finally snapping out of his dissociative fugue to turn his visor disapprovingly on his fellow officer.

"The best part of creations is their ability to be more than we made them to be, right?" the seeker sniffed.

They probably could have weaponized the non-expression Soundave gave him to melt through Ole Slashy's armor.

"I can't stand this! What's it doing in there!?" Skywarp whimpered.

"Why don't you go check?" his trineleader suggested, and the teleporter shook his helm frantically.

There was no need, anyway, because a moment later, there came a faint whirring sound, and Ole Slashy rolled slowly out of the darkness of the control room, stopping just short in the doorway. Everyone scrambled backward, and Starscream found himself somehow pushed to the front of the group with nothing between himself and the deadly chainsaws of his pet project.

"Um... Unit One?" he called, trying to step back into the crowd only to get several sharp pinches to his wings and one on the aft that he reflected had better have been Skywarp's doing. "S-status report?"

"SEEKING TARGET," the drone replied, its optics flashing slightly.

"Yeah, uh... Did you think about maybe... _aborting_ the whole 'seeking target' thing? Maybe?" Starscream laughed awkwardly. He felt stupid, holding a conversation with something he knew full well would fail the Ambus test worse than some of the things growing in the more neglected corners of the mess hall, but none of the commands he'd programmed into it were working so well, either.

"PRIME DIRECTIVE: HALT FUNCTIONALITY OF TARGET MEGATRON," Ole Slashy announced, its gaze sweeping over the figures in the hall. "TARGET MEGATRON NOT FOUND. SEEKING TARGET."

And it started to advance toward them at a slow but steady roll.

Skywarp screamed.

"Nobody panic!" Starscream shrieked, backing up along with the rest of his comrades. "It won't bother us if we don't bother it!"

"Starscream's believability; limited," Soundwave intoned.

"Didn't you give it _any_ weaknesses?" Scrapper wanted to know as the drone continued pushing them back.

"Okay, so _maybe_ it would be possible to pull it apart at the joints," Starscream finally confessed, "but we'd need someone with big enough servos to get a grip on it and strong enough to break the connections!"

"Or... two seekers with some really strong cable flying in opposite directions?" Scrapper suggested.

"...Yes, that would probably work, but how would we—"

"Rumble, Frenzy; obtain cable," Soundwave interrupted, and the two cassetticons darted off, looking grateful for an excuse to get out of there. "Current objective; contain threat."

" _How are we going to get the cable around it!?_ " Starscream tried again.

"We'll figure that out when the time comes," Thundercracker put in. "For now, anyone have any ideas of how to keep this thing in one place?"

Starscream was just opening his mouth to make a suggestion when the sound of heavy pedefalls quickly approaching rang out from farther down the corridor.

"Starscream, what did you do _this_ time!?" Megatron's deep voice boomed, and the seeker felt his energon lines run cold.

"TARGET LOCATED. ENGAGING FULL OFFENSIVE MODE!" Slashy blared.

"What the _Pit_ is that!?" Megatron demanded from much closer now.

"GO AWAY!" Starscream shrieked, whirling to face him. He had just enough time to see his commander start slightly at his outburst before something slammed into his side, sending him spinning over into Thundercracker and Scrapper. It was Slashy, of course, barreling through them all on his way to Megatron.

The warlord growled in annoyance and dodged aside at the drone's first assault. Slashy flew past him and skidded around for another pass. Megatron raised his fusion cannon.

"Megatron! Danger to ship!" Soundwave shouted, and their commander lowered his weapon with a frustrated click of his glossa.

He was getting ready to grapple with the ting, Starscream realized.

" _Warp!_ " the seeker shrieked, still trying to untangle himself from the other two. "What did I tell you!?"

"Oh, right!" There was a flash, and Skywarp appeared further down the hall, directly between Megatron and Slashy.

"TURN AROUND, IDIOT!" Starscream screamed as Megatron blinked in surprise at the seeker's sudden appearance.

Skywarp did turn, just as one of Slashy's arms came swinging to take his helm off his shoulders. Megatron grabbed him, attempting to pull him out of the way, but not quite in time. The end of the chainsaw caught the seeker across the throat.

"NO!" Starscream heard Thundercracker shouting—or maybe it was him?—as energon sprayed the droid and continued pulsing out between their trinemate's digits as he clutched at the wound.

Megatron caught the seeker with one arm, and raised the other to fire his fusion cannon at the droid that was now swinging a whirling arm at the warlord's helm.

The force of the blast in such a small area was fantastic, and it took several minutes for all the shaking to stop. There was so much dust and smoke in the air that Starscream couldn't see anything except the glows of his comrades' optics through the haze. He called out for his trinemates, and found that his own voice was oddly muffled. He reset his audials a couple of times, and the sounds of other people's voices finally reached him.

"—some pressure there! Frag, I can't _see_ anything!" he heard Scrapper speaking and hurried toward the noise.

"Hang in there, Warp! I got you!" That one was Thundercracker, and now Starscream was close enough to see their dark forms through the gloom.

Something grabbed his shoulder just before he'd reached them, and the seeker found himself being spun around to face a pair of familiarly sinister optics floating in the fog somewhere above him.

"You know, I woke up this morning after you'd left, and I thought to myself, 'This is going to be a good day. I can't think of anything that could possibly happen to ruin this day,'" the warlord growled. "Why must you always prove me wrong?"

"I like to keep you on your toes," Starscream sniffed. "Keeps the rust off you."

"Your trinemate is _dying_ because of _your_ stupidity!" Megatron bellowed at him.

"He'll be fine!" the seeker protested as his spark clenched painfully with something that might have been guilt. "And this only happened because Thundercracker insisted that I turn it on before it was ready!"

"I didn't either!" the other seeker spoke up.

"You stay out of this!" Starscream snarled in his general direction. "Is Warp okay?"

"No thanks to you!" Scrapper called back. "I stopped the energon flow, but he's lost a lot already."

"This hallway; unsafe," Soundwave announced from behind them.

"Scrapper, is it safe to move Skywarp?" Megatron wanted to know.

"As long as we don't jostle his helm too much," the medic replied. "My welds aren't quite as good as Hook's, but they should hold."

"Right, let's get..."

The warlord trailed off as Starscream's servo shot out to grip his arm.

"What?" he demanded.

The seeker just pointed mutely down toward the end of the hallway, where, through the slowly clearing dust, they could just make out the shape of a silhouette that was starting to become a little too well-known rolling toward them.

"I am banning you from your labs for the rest of your existence, Starscream," Megatron told him.

"SEEKING TARGET," Slashy droned out from the other end of the hall.

"That thing's still alive!?" Thundercracker despaired.

"Not for long," Megatron growled.

"Wait, wait!" Starscream hissed, tightening his grip on the warlord's arm as he started trying to move forward again. "Soundwave! Can you cut all the lights?"

"Purpose?" the communications officer wanted to know.

"It has no heat-sensing capabilities. It's dependent on light alone," the seeker explained.

"That might have been a useful bit of tactical information from the beginning," Scrapper grumbled.

"Access to central ship systems; lost," Soundwave informed him.

"Ugh, fine," Starscream groaned, raising a nullray to fire at the nearest light array.

"TARGETS LOST! TARGETS LOST!" Slashy blared as the hallway plunged into total darkness.

"Do we have any kind of plan for this thing?" Megatron wanted to know, and the seeker switched on his heat vision to see him.

 _::Use the comms, or it'll just find you by your voice, dimwit!::_ Starscream replied. _::Thundercracker and I are going to tie cables around it and fly in opposite directions. We're just waiting on Rumble and Frenzy to bring us some.::_

 _::Soundwave, ETA on the cable?::_

Starscream felt the line widen as Megatron added the communications officer to it.

 _::Cassetticons; successful. ETA; five minutes.::_

 _::Okay, so we just need to keep it from accidentally rolling over Skywarp or chopping anyone else's helm off until then,::_ the warlord decided.

 _::Agreed,::_ Starscream put in, eying his injured trinemate on the floor. Skywarp's heat signature was dangerously lower than everyone else's, but he would be okay so long as they could get him down to the medbay in the very near future. Starscream widened their channel farther to include Thundercracker and Scrapper.

 _::I'm going to sneak around it and draw it away. You two get Skywarp out as soon as there's an opening.::_

 _::What!? Starscream, you'll get yourself killed!::_ Thundercracker protested.

 _::Who will the other seeker pulling that thing apart be if Thundercracker leaves?::_ Megatron wanted to know.

 _::You'll just have to hold on very tight,::_ Starscream told him, and the warlord snorted.

Slashy was getting dangerously close by then, so Starscream wasted no more time before darting out. He was putting himself in danger, yes, but he was the only one both small enough to get around it in the corridor without its notice and fast enough to evade its attacks afterward. His decision had absolutely nothing to do with any guilt he might have felt for being somewhat responsible for this situation, he told himself. Still, his spark was in his throat, and he half-expected chainsaws to hack into him every moment of the way as he skidded past the thing and kept going down the hallway.

"Hey, nano-processor!" he called out when he'd gotten a sufficient distance away. "Megatron's over here!"

Slashy whirled around and started toward him.

"SEEKING TARGET. DESTROY MEGATRON. SEEKING TARGET," it announced.

"Yeah? Seek this!" the seeker snarled, heaving up a piece of rubble and chucking it at the droid as hard as he could.

The thing wobbled slightly on its one wheel at the impact, and Starscream hummed with interest. Of course, he couldn't get through its plating, but that didn't mean it was immune to external forces. He picked up some larger pieces of rubble, and continued throwing them to slow Slashy down as it continued its approach.

Behind the droid, he caught the flash of movement that was Thundercracker and Scrapper heaving Skywarp up between them and taking off down a side corridor. Starscream smirked. This just might work. They just might be okay. He chucked another piece of rubble at his drone, and the thing paused in its tracks this time.

"What? You getting tired?" Starscream taunted it.

"OBSTACLE TO PRIME DIRECTIVE. MUST DESTROY," it replied.

"Well, come on, then. Let's see what you've got."

Slashy just seemed to hunker down and lean forward slightly, a strange whirring noise escaping it.

 _::What's it doing?::_ Megatron wanted to know.

 _::Slagged if I know,::_ Starscream replied.

"ENGINES FULLY CHARGED," Slashy announced.

Starscream barely had time to register the words before the droid was rocketing toward him at speeds it should not have had. The seeker shrieked in panic and dove out of the way just in time. Slashy was coming back around at him before he could get his pedes back under himself, and he had to tuck in his wings and roll wildly to avoid a barrage of chainsaw blows aimed down at him. It wasn't the easiest maneuver in a hallway full of rubble.

The attack stopped for a moment, and Starscream managed to get up to his knees to see Megatron gripping the droid around the waist, lifting it clear off the floor.

"Go get the cable!" his commander bellowed at him.

"PRIME TARGET DETECTED! PRIME TARGET DETECTED!" Slashy announced, sounding almost excited at the prospect, and then started to spin at the waist to get its chainsaws at the mech holding it.

Megatron quickly let go and stepped back, grunting as one of the weapons caught him in a shallow wound across the chest. Slashy raised an arm to go at him again, and Starscream launched himself at the thing's exposed back without really thinking about it.

"STARSCREAM, _NO!_ " he heard Megatron shouting as he landed on the drone's shoulders. The seeker ignored him and pulled in his wings to avoid slashy's flailing limbs as he grabbed hold of the droid's helm and started to pull. Cables be pitted, he was going to _end_ this thing!

"OBSTACLE DETECTED! OBSTACLE DETECTED!" Slashy blared, and it started to spin wildly.

Starscream hung on for dear life until one of his legs slipped, and he found himself crashing into a wall with enough force to knock the air from his vents.

"DESTROY OBSTACLE. DESTROY," he heard the drone declare, and onlined his optics just in time to see the chainsaw coming to slice him in half.

The seeker dodged sideways, but not quite quickly enough. A seering pain flared up from his shoulder and Starscream let out a howl as the drone severed his left arm from the rest of his body. He scrambled away, trying frantically to reroute the energon flow from his severed brachial line, waiting for a follow-up blow that never came. Instead, he heard a sudden wrenching sound, and paused to look back.

Megatron had just grabbed hold of one of Slashy's arms, uncaring of the blades slicing his palms as he planted his pede on the drone's side and _ripped_. The arm popped right out of its socket, and the warlord then flipped it around to turn it on its owner before the chainsaw blade could even stop spinning. A second later, the drone's helm was soaring down the hall.

Starscream blinked. All that panic, and Megatron had ended the thing in two seconds flat.

"Soundwave, I don't think we'll be needing that cable after all," Megatron announced in the silence that followed.

He moved toward his second, still collapsed on the ground, and knelt down in front of him.

"Can I expect a death droid as thanks for every night we spend together?" he asked.

"This was... I was making it before!" Starscream told him. "I was going to throw it away, and then Thundercracker was making fun of me and saying it couldn't work, and—"

"Stop," Megatron growled. "Just stop, Starscream. It's... Other than your arm, are you okay?"

The seeker nodded.

"Good. Then, let's let this be the last—"

The sound of rending metal cut him off, and he choked, optics flying wide as he juttered forward slightly. Starscream's own optics widened in horror as a large chainsaw forced itself through his commander's chest with a spray of energon. Behind Megatron, the seeker caught sight of Slashy's helmless, one-armed body, still driving its weapon forward until the warlord gave a final grunt and the light in his optics spluttered out.

"TARGET DESTROYED. POWERING DOWN," Slashy's helm announced from somewhere farther down the hallway.

"No...," the seeker gasped, staring at his leader's slumped, immobile form. There was still energon flowing bright and thick from his chest, but the rest of his heat signature was fading fast. Slashy had gone right through his spark chamber.  
Starscream couldn't move, he couldn't breathe, his whole world was crashing down around him in that one moment. It couldn't be. It was a dream. It couldn't be. His assassination attempts never worked. They _never worked._ That was the whole point of them...

He got to his pedes shakily as Soundwave came skidding to a halt at their leader's side. Some remaining sense told Starscream that the communications officer was speaking to him, but he couldn't hear any of it. He felt numb. He couldn't even feel the pain of his missing limb anymore.

He did the only thing that made sense at the time.

He ran.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter Four: Pining**

Starscream didn't know how long he flew for. With one of his wingtips and an arm missing, he had to do it in bipedal mode, which wasn't half so efficient. He managed to make land before his fuel levels dropped to critical, though, and crashed face first into a field of reeds that turned out to be a good deal wetter than expected.

Not that he cared.

Megatron was dead.

Starscream had told himself he wanted that so many times in the past that he had actually believed it for a while there, but now he had it, all thoughts of leading the Decepticons or ruling Cybertron had evaporated. All he wanted to do was lie here in this organic muck until he rusted away.

At some point, he must have fallen offline, because he found himself waking to an obnoxiously bright sky and flaring low fuel warnings. Apparently he wasn't quite so done with being alive as he'd thought, because that was enough to have the seeker heaving himself up out of the mud and staggering off toward the nearest thing that might have been settlement. His severed shoulder hurt a lot more now that he wasn't in shock, but he gritted his dentae against it and kept going.

The humans in the little town he found all ran around screaming obnoxiously, but Starscream didn't even have the spark to kick any of them. He found their fuel station and drank as much of the crude, organic sludge as he could stomach before taking off again. If he stayed around, the Autobots would find him, and rusting to death in a cave was preferable to dying at _their_ servos.

It took him a while to find a suitable hole in the ground, and by then his processor was starting to glitch from pain, low-quality fuel, and probably the start of a rust infection. Starscream had turned his comms off when he left base, but he kept hearing voices as he burrowed himself into the back of the cave.

"Nothing you do ever works. Why did you think this would be any different? Why are you so stupid?" Thundercracker's disapproving voice rang out in his helm even as Skywarp's more frantic tones chimed in with:

"What did you do to me!? Why would you put me in danger like that?! I could've died, Star! But you don't care, do you!? I hate you so much!"

And finally, Megatron's deep, accusing rumble: "I've fallen, Starscream. Now what? Was it worth it?"

Starscream curled in on himself, pressing his remaining servo over one of his audials, and sobbed.

* * *

Time faded into a strange amalgamation, and Starscream lost track of even when he'd been offline or on. The only differences were how vivid his hallucinations were and how urgently his error messages flashed at him.

He'd seen phantom images of his trinemates, Megatron, other Decepticons, and even Autobots coming to scream diatribe or mock him so many times that it wasn't such a surprise when his processor glitched so hard that he started feeling their servos on him. It was his stalled cooling fans that did it, he was sure. Either that or the organic sludge dripping on him from the cave ceiling was starting to corrode his processor.

"Starscream? Starscream, can you hear me!?" he heard Skywarp shouting from very far off as frantic servos grabbed his face. "T.C., he's not responding!"

"Help me get him out of here!" his other trinemate cut in.

Starscream was vaguely aware of someone moving him, gravity shifting, and then brilliant daylight that hurt his optics even while shuttered.

"Is he gonna be okay?"

"Yeah, I'm gonna take an image capture of this for blackmail purposes, though."

Starscream frowned and managed to convince his optics to open a crack. His trinemates' hazy forms stared down at him, silhouetted against a bright, blue sky.

"He's waking up!" Skywarp shouted, and Starscream winced against the noise. This was certainly one of the more accurate Skywarp halucinations he'd had.

"We gotta get him back to base before he overheats or something," Thundercracker grunted. "I'll let Hook know we're coming."

It wasn't until he was being squeezed through one of Skywarp's teleportations that Starscream realized he wasn't halucinating this time.

He came out the other side screaming (going through a warp with critical damage was not comfortable) to find himself in the middle of the _Nemesis's_ medbay. If he hadn't been screaming already, he would have now. His trinemates clearly were holding a grudge against him, or they wouldn't have brought him back here. All of Megatron's disgusting sycophants were going to pull him apart. It would have been more merciful to let him finish rusting in that cave.

"Frag, he's in bad shape..." he heard Hook grumbling. "Hold him down for me."

Starscream didn't have the energy left to fight as the medic worked a drip into one of his energon lines. The seeker instantly felt his frame growing even heavier.

"How long will it take to get him functional again?" Thundercracker wanted to know.

"Eh... He'll be his regular horrible self in a day or two," Hook answered.

Starscream felt a careful servo on his helm and forced his optics back open to see Skywarp smiling down at him indulgently.

"Rest up, Star," the other seeker chirped, and then blissful nothingness claimed Starscream at last.

* * *

Coming back online took a while, but at least Starscream wasn't in pain for the first time in days. Well, mostly, he realized, as he felt a phantom twinge from his missing arm.

His processor was also clear enough to actually think at long last. Megatron was dead, and that was a terrible, aching hole in his spark, but if he, Starscream, was still alive, then he had a duty to lead the Decepticons in his commander's place. He could not allow them to lose the war because of his own blunder, after all. The question was what he would have to do to get the troops to accept him as their new commander. That was always the difficult part.

It seemed like he might have a head start on it, though. He had killed Megatron, but his trinemates had tracked him down and brought him back anyway. At first, he had thought it was to torture him or some such, but Hook had given him medical treatment without complaint or question, too. Was this their way of saying that they were going to follow him?

Starscream unshuttered his optics and glanced around the medbay. There was no one around—not even one of the Constructicons. He frowned and swung his pedes carefully over the edge of the berth. The second he was upright, his helm started to spin, and he had to hunch over for a minute to stop himself purging his tanks.

As soon as he could move without feeling like his knees were going to give out beneath him, Starscream headed for the exit. He felt strangely off balance with one arm still missing, but managed anyway.

There were still deep gashes in a few of the walls that he passed on his way to the bridge. Starscream tried not to look at them. Every time he did, he saw that chainsaw forcing its way through Megatron's spark, the light in his leader's optics dimming out...

A couple of tears leaked down the seeker's cheeks, and he scrubbed at them furiously with the back of his servo. He wasn't going to cry anymore, he told himself. He needed to keep the past behind him where it belonged, no matter how badly it hurt.

 _If only you'd said something to him sooner_ , a treacherous part of his processor whispered. _You could've been together months ago... you could've_ kept _being together for years and years..._

No, it was stupid to think about what might have been. He needed to keep pushing forward. The Decepticons needed him.

He turned the corner into the hall leading to the command room—the hall where Megatron had died—and squeezed his optics shut so he wouldn't have to see the gruesomely familiar landscape as he walked along it.

There weren't many 'bots on the bridge. Soundwave was there, supervising the Constructicons in repairing the many destroyed consoles. That explained why none of them had been in the medbay when he'd woken, but Starscream couldn't help wondering why the damage hadn't been fixed yet. Thundercracker was there, too, talking over what looked like battle schematics with Onslaught. Skywarp was peering over his shoulder.

"We can't just charge in from the North like that," the blue seeker was saying in exasperated tones. "It's completely open! We'd need to... Starscream!"

His optics widened as he caught sight of his trine leader. Skywarp looked up, too, and let out a shriek as he bowled Thundercracker over on his way to Starscream's side. Starscream grunted as his trinemate collided with him, pulling him into a crushing embrace.

"What are you doing here?" Thundercracker asked, surging toward them. "You should still be in the medbay! Hook said it'll take another day before all the rust is cleared out of your internals."

Starscream opened his mouth to respond and his vocalizer stalled. He clutched at his throat in confusion and restarted it a couple of times. He supposed he probably had rust to blame for that, too.

"Star, you dummy!" Skywarp pouted as he pulled back at last. There was a jagged weld across his throat, Starscream now realized with a twinge of guilt. "I thought I was gonna die! And then I thought _you_ were gonna die! Why you gotta be like this!?"

The others in the room had noticed the commotion by then, and all optics had turned to the seeekrs.

"I... have to... command," Starscream managed to croak out. "Back... to work!"

"Starscream; not well," Soundwave spoke up.

"Come on, Star. Let's go lay down," Thundercracker murmured, planting a gentle but firm servo on his trine leader's shoulder.

Starscream tried to resist but found his frame significantly lacking in strength that it should have had.

"I'm...fine! Have to... lead... Decepticons..." he protested, digging in his pedes as both trinemates started pushing him toward the door.

"No, you don't, Star. You really don't," Skywarp assured him.

"But... Megatron... gone. I... I have to... Warp, T.C... Megatron's gone!"

Starscream twisted around to face his nearest trinemate, which turned out to be Thundercracker, seizing hold of the other seeker's clavicle seam and staring up at him desperately.

"Gone!" he repeated, and this time, he felt moisture stinging the corners of his optics.

Thundercracker just looked confused. "What are you..."

The doors slid open behind Starscream, and Thundercracker and Skywarp suddenly snapped to attention, their optics fixed on whoever had just walked onto the bridge.

"Sir," Thundercracker grunted, inclining his helm respectfully. "I was just trying to get him back to the medbay."

Starscream frowned, wondering who on Earth Thundercracker would be referring to as 'sir' other than himself and Soundwave. If that glitch Shockwave had swept in from Cybertron to steal his command from him...

"'Trying', Thundercracker? Just throw him over your shoulder and take him there. Or shall I do it myself?" said a gruff voice, and Starscream felt his spark stop.

It couldn't be. There was no possible way. He was hearing things, probably as a result of the pain blockers that Hook had pumped into him.

But then a large servo seized his shoulder, whirling him around, and Starscream found himself nose-to-chassis with...

"Megatron?" he squeaked, not daring to look up and meet the other mech's optics. There was a large, fresh weld down the center of his commander's chassis, but it was otherwise whole and complete once again. Starscream barely had time to appreciate it before the impossible apparition was bending down to seize him around the thighs and hoisting him over its shoulder like a sack of rocks.

The seeker tried to cry out in indignation, but his vocalizer stalled again at the strain.

"I'll see to it that he makes it safely back where he came from," Megatron rumbled, and Starscream clung to him in shock as he started back out into the corridor.

The whole way to the medbay, Starscream still couldn't believe this was real. Megatron had died. He had _watched_ him die! But the shoulder beneath him was so familiarly warm and large, and that was definitely _his_ Megatron's aft rolling back and forth not far from his face. This was... It was an imposter! Shockwave had stolen their leader's sparkless frame for himself, or made a clone, or... or...

Before Starscream could come up with any other likely theories, they were stepping through the doors of the medbay again, and the Megatron imposter was setting him down on the berth with a thump.

"Starscream?" the warlord growled, and the seeker couldn't deny that was his voice. Still, he couldn't look at him. He couldn't handle it if he were to look into those optics and see someone other than his leader looking back at him. A strong servo found his jaw, though, forcing his face upward. He squeezed his optics shut.

"You're not real," he wheezed. "You can't be real."

"Starscream, look at me," Megatron ordered, but his voice was softer now.

Starscream squeezed his optics shut tighter, feeling the tears that had started welling up in the command center starting to spill over.

"You died," he choked.

"I didn't."

"I saw... through your spark... You... you were dead!"

"You were mistaken. It missed my spark. Just open your optics."

He finally did, blinking against the tears that were blurring his vision, and two dark red optics almost as familiar as his own crinkled down at him in amusement.

Starscream was glad that the medbay was empty save the two of them at that moment, because he wasn't sure he could have restrained himself even if the entirety of the Autobots' forces had been present. He burst into tears—loud, messy, ugly tears. Through his sobs, he could hear Megatron laughing at him, and he struck out, wishing he had both arms to do so with.

"You... you... Don't like... you!" he wailed.

Megatron just kissed his cheek and pulled him into a tight embrace.

"I was worried sick about you," he rumbled, running a servo up and down the seeker's spinal strut. "Thought you would get captured by humans or Autobots or just rust away somewhere I couldn't find you... Why did you run away?"

Starscream just shook his helm, burying his face further in his commander's armor. If this was a dream, he hoped that he never woke up.

* * *

Starscream cried himself to sleep in Megatron's arms, and woke level-headed enough to feel the embarrassment of that.

"Hello again," a deep voice rumbled somewhere out of his line of sight, and the seeker quickly shuttered his optics. "You've been out for ten hours," Megatron informed him.

Starscream cracked an optic at him. "Have you been watching me recharge this whole time, creep?" he demanded, glad to find his vocalizer was working properly again.

His commander snorted and heaved himself up from the chair he'd been sitting in.

"No, I'm also a patient at the moment. I may not be dead, but I did take a chainsaw to the chest," he grumbled, moving over to stand by the seeker's berth.

"Where are the medics?" Starscream wanted to know, shifting uncomfortably as Megatron's frame came close enough to feel his warmth.

"Off fixing some other part of the ship, I imagine," his commander replied.

"Yes, I was wondering about that," the seeker muttered, pushing himself up into a sitting position. His helm didn't spin so much this time, but his spark was hammering in his chest as he tried not to look at Megatron too much. "Why isn't the ship put back together yet? You've had days."

"Well..." and now it was Megatron's turn to shuffle awkwardly. "All of our resources were... otherwise engaged for a while."

Starscream frowned. "What? Did the Autobots try to attack us, or something? Rather uncharacteristic of Prime to make an offensive move."

"We were looking for you, idiot," his commander growled, and the seeker blinked at him, a strange warmth thrilling through his lines.

"What? Everyone?" he wanted to know. "Whatever did you have to offer them to capture their interest in such an endeavor?"

"I threatened to reactivate that droid of yours if you weren't back here by the end of the week."

"Ah."

The two of them fell silent for a moment, the sound of Starscream's spark monitor the only sound in the room as the moment stretched between them.

"Starscream—"

"I'm not going to apologize," the seeker interrupted. "It was an accident, and I did nothing wrong!"

"You built a death droid and programmed it to kill me!" Megatron contradicted.

"Only because you weren't paying enough attention to me!"

"I'm perfectly willing to pay attention to you any time you aren't being a whiny glitch!"

"You _only_ pay attention to me when I'm being a whiny glitch! Why do you think I do it!?"

"Because you're a fundamentally flawed and insecure mech with crippling egomania," Megatron grumbled.

"And _you're_ a pig-headed, overgrown socket wrench!" Starscream snapped at him. Then, after a moment's thought, he added, "And you're old." Just for good measure.

"Didn't stop me blowing a few of _your_ sockets the other night," his commander smirked at him.

Starscream felt his face flush furiously, and he opened his mouth to scream an insult he hadn't quite finished composing yet only to find Megatron's mouth clamping over it. He struggled for a second before deciding that this was far preferable to arguing anyway and kissing back. Megatron was climbing up on the berth with him, tilting him backward as he left the seeker's lips to trail kisses over his cheeks and down his neck.

"Not... Someone could walk in!" Starscream protested as one of the warlord's servos squeezed around his good wing.

Megatron huffed in annoyance, and sat up enough to look the seeker in the optic.

"Why did you leave me?" he repeated his question from earlier.

"Wha... I thought you were _dead!_ " Starscream protested.

"And that made you want to run away?" Megatron asked, one optic ridge rising.

Starscream just scowled at him, his face so hot he was sure the other mech could feel it.

"I came back," he muttered after a while, turning away.

"You got dragged back, you mean."

"I would've come back on my own if I'd known you were alive!"

"And if you weren't falling apart at the hinges by then," Megatron snorted. "I saw you just a half-hour after they dragged out out of that cave. You had moss in your cockpit."

The seeker shuddered at the thought. He was glad he'd been too addled to know what was going on at that point.

"I would've had to come back eventually," he insisted.

"For me?" Megatron wanted to know. "Or... for this?"

He leaned over Starscream's helm and grabbed something from a cart that was sitting just out of the seeker's line of sight. When he brought it to where Starscream could see it, the seeker's mouth dropped open; it was his own severed arm.

"You... _Why haven't they put it back on yet!?_ " he demanded.

"They've been too busy cleaning up your mess," Megatron told him, leaning back to keep the limb out of Starscream's reach as the seeker surged up to grab it.

"Give it here!" his second squawked, medical apparatus popping out of his ports as he went at the warlord.

"No." Megatron grinned as he deftly smacked the seeker round the back of the helm with his own servo.

"Unbe _liev_ able!" Starscream screeched.

"You deserve it," his commander told him levelly. "I almost died."

"So did I!"

"I'm glad you didn't."

Starscream stopped then, looking up into Megatron's optics. They were entirely sincere and full of warmth.

"I... I suppose I'm glad that you survived as well," he mumbled, his gaze fixed on the other mech's face.

"No more death droids from now on," Megatron said firmly, and Starscream nodded in agreement. "And if you sneak into my quarters in the middle of the night, you'd better be there for something more pleasant than sticking squids all over me. And never, ever leave me again."

"Then you agree never to hurt me again," the seeker hissed.

"Only if you ask me nicely," his commander assured him, a suggestive grin quirking his mouth.

Starscream rolled his optics. "Insufferable..." he muttered.

"Would you want me any other way?" his commander asked, servos moving down to caress the seeker's hips.

No, Starscream supposed as he looked up into the warlord's hopeful optics. He supposed he wouldn't.

There probably were only three things necessary for a foolproof plan to overthrow Megatron, the seeker considered as he let the larger mech pull him up into his lap, and he might never know what those three things were. He had discovered instead that there was only one thing necessary for a foolproof plan to work his way into his leader's spark, and it just so happened to be spinning inside his own chest.

"Also, you're suspended as Air Commander until further notice," Megatron murmured against one of the seeker's cheek vents.

Starscream pulled back sharply, and the barrage of vitriol he rained down on his commander echoed throughout most of the ship.


End file.
